


what I want and what I need

by CaricatureOfAWitch



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: AU, Gen, I'm low-key in love with the Master, Missy is an aesthetic all by herself, Oneshot, Regeneration, anyway doesn't matter, because I have no idea yet what canon has to say, because Missy is just a cover name thing, in my headcanon she will always keep calling herself the Master, like really absolutely AU, so please accept this as not at all canon-compliant please
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-12
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-01 10:14:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11484240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaricatureOfAWitch/pseuds/CaricatureOfAWitch
Summary: Complete AU because I hadn't even started s9 yet when I started writing this. Missy, just regenerated and freshly escaped from the time-locked Gallifrey, actually just wanted a bit of time to get herself together (does it really matter that she broke in and stole someone's clothes?), but the Doctor doesn't even let her have a plan before he's already there to ruin it.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The main reason this exists is my girlfriend and I fantasising a very pretty picture of Gomez!Master at some point, looking very aesthetically pleasing with wet her, a cup of tea, and wearing some sort of dressing gown. My mind took it and escalated.
> 
> The title (I have a title now!) is inspired by the song "Flawed Design" by Stabilo. It doesn't really fit this particular AU, but I think it kinda fits with the whole Twelve/Missy situation in general, a bit, from what I've seen. I'm not at series 10 yet.

Hair. The hair was the first indicator, really, once he got his bearings back enough to realise that there seemed to be a veritable mane surrounding his face, a few brown, wavy strands hanging into his face and obscuring his vision. He got his fingers tangled for a moment as he tried to brush them out of the way. He hadn’t even had hair that long at the Academy. With a quiet curse, he stumbled to his feet, only to pause at the sound of his voice. He cleared his throat and tried again, but it still sounded strangely high-pitched. Too much so to be attributed to a dry throat. And combined with the fact that somehow the floor seemed a lot closer than he was used to…

A quick patting down, and he had his answer. Well. _She_. She had her answer. Now, that was certainly interesting. An image of the Doctor’s face, speechless for once, floated before her mind’s eye, and her new lips quirked into a grin. Very interesting indeed.

It was a pity she didn’t have time to think about it in detail right now.

***

Running, be it metaphorical or literal, should definitely be left to the Doctor, the Master decided. Of course, even leaning against the door of the house she’d just broken into, out of breath, swimming in too large clothes and sweat plastering her hair to her skin, she still couldn’t deny that there hadn’t been another option. No time for elaborate plans and plots and safety nets. She hadn’t been expecting an opportunity like that, none of her more or less thought-out schemes and ideas had included all this, but she couldn’t exactly be picky, now could she. The tiniest opening in the time lock’s boundaries, just the smallest fissure – she hadn’t known where it had come from or why it was there, and in that moment, she couldn’t have cared less. It was a way out.

That upon leaving her hiding place she’d been discovered almost instantly had been sheer bad luck, but at least it could be said that the Time Lady who’d spotted her had been even less lucky – the Master wouldn’t be able to brag about _finesse_ to anyone, but she had nonetheless managed to prevent her unfortunate ex-compatriot from telling anyone where she had run off to. She might even have done the Master a favour, in a way. Not that she was overly fond of being forced to regenerate, but at least it helped cover her tracks a little. It wouldn’t have taken too long for anyone to arrive at the scene, since Lady Whoever had managed to sound an alarm before the Master could stop her, but due to her untimely demise, she couldn’t exactly tell anyone what had transpired, and the residue energy swirling around the corridor might easily be blamed on the aborted regeneration attempt of one cheeky Time Lady who hadn’t known what she was messing with, and wouldn’t be messing with anyone anymore. Ergo – no one knew what had happened, and with a bit of luck, no one would connect the presence of a stumbling Time Lady in too large clothes to the renegade Time Lord who’d spent most of his time evading discovery by hiding. Not very dignified, no, but there was a saying about desperate times.

The TARDIS she managed to escape with was no more dignified either. She was half tempted to vow to never make fun of the Doctor’s old Type 40 again. This machine was closer to death than to anything resembling life, and its attempts to build up a telepathic connection to the Master left her with a pounding headache while she tried to operate the smoking and partly demolished controls. Her original plans hadn’t necessarily involved capsules in quite such a state of disrepair, although she should maybe have expected that. They also had not involved being in quite as much of a hurry, or having had to regenerate only minutes previous, but after a few moderately eloquent curses there was no time to dwell on these things. She didn’t even dare kick the damn thing’s console, lest it refused to move out of spite, or simply fell apart underneath her feet. No, this was her one chance to escape the hellhole that was once supposed to be home, and she was determined to take it.

It took a lot of cursing, minute manipulating of levers and buttons and modules and whatnot, with shaky fingers and clenched teeth, until the TARDIS had inched its way out through an opening that should, by all means, be too small in a spatio-temporal sense to actually slip through. However, both she and the Doctor had always tended to take words like “impossible” as a challenge, of course. She didn’t know if her narrow escape had any effect on the Time Lock and what remained inside it, nor did she care now that she was on the other side. Hearts beating erratically in her chest, she urged the groaning, almost whimpering machine to land on the next best planet it could lock on to, the sound of a large bronze bell resonating through the rooms all the way there. The Master had barely made it three steps out the door when the bell’s ringing merged into a hideous sound like screeching fingernails on rough stone and metal bending and twisting and breaking, and she was all too aware that this particular TARDIS had made its last journey. One step at a time, now, she told herself. At least it had gotten her out.

Wherever she was, it was night, or late evening, and the only thing around seemed to be a reasonably large house that hinted strongly at (in this case, wealthy) humanoid natives, which meant with a bit of luck she wouldn’t look too conspicuous. Breaking in didn’t go as smoothly as she’d have hoped – there was some sort of alarm system that appeared to be set to “owners on vacation, call the authorities if someone so much as breathes on the door” – but even with unsteady hands and a slightly blurred vision, disabling the rather primitive technology wasn’t too much of a feat. Not that she couldn’t deal with homeowners or local authorities if any showed up, but she needed to get out of sight and to something at least resembling safety, and it was a lot less taxing with no one trying to stand in her way yet again.

Once she had caught her breath, which had really been embarrassingly out of control – there was no reason for panic, it wasn’t like anyone could have followed her – once she had caught her breath, she pushed away from the front door and stumbled deeper into her new temporary residence. Her clothes were too large and too warm, she was covered in sweat and she could feel her hair becoming more and more comfortable with being a damp, knotted mess all around her face. She’d have to take care of that.

***

An hour later found her sitting at the kitchen table, damp hair haphazardly held up and out of the way by a hair tie and a few clips, with just a few wavy strands still dangling around her face. She had forgotten how bothersome long hair could be, but after a thorough examination of her new face in the mirror she was unwilling to trim it, which had been her first impulse. She’d figure out what to do with it soon enough. What she needed first were clothes. After her shower, she had sifted through every wardrobe she could find, only to discover that every resident of this particular domicile had to be at least a head taller than her, which was really not fair at all. She would have to find herself shoes with heels.

Unable to find anything her size, the Master had finally settled on a slightly too large silk dressing gown. Since no one in this house had a sense of style and therefore almost everything was held in bright pastel colours, the thing of course had to be eggshell white with soft pink adornments, and she had to push up the sleeves every three seconds if she wanted to use her hands, but it would do for the moment.

She had found a newspaper lying around, doubtlessly a few days old at least but still worth scanning for a bit of information on where and when she had ended up. Although, the “where” part of course had become obvious rather soon, and only the fact that her head already hurt enough as it was had stopped her from banging it against a shelf in frustration. Did every wrecked TARDIS default its settings to the same rainy island on the same stupid planet?

At least humans produced palatable tea. It might be their only redeeming quality.

The newspaper told her that she had turned up in Earth’s year 2142, which didn’t tell her much since unlike certain others she had never cared to memorize Earth history, but if she recalled correctly there weren’t currently any major wars happening, which meant one thing less to worry about. Beyond that… she needed clothes. She needed shoes, she needed practical clothes, she needed something fancy, maybe a dress. She would keep the hair clips and ties she had found in the bathroom. She needed food, she needed to get off this ape-ridden floating rock and therefore she needed a plan and a spaceship or a teleport or a vortex manipulator, she needed to find a new basis of operation which meant she might need forged documents or at least a bit of psychic paper, she needed a weapon, she needed to find out what the Doctor was up to, she needed… the Master blinked a few times at the blurring newspaper in front of her and eventually set it down on the table, together with the almost empty cup of tea that had almost slipped from her grip. She needed, possibly, to sleep.

***

On the way to the nearest bedroom, it felt like the floor was rolling under her feet, and after staggering through the doorway, the Master all but collapsed onto the mattress, not bothering to remove her stolen fluffy slippers or to pull the blanket around her. She’d have to come up with a cover name if she wanted to keep the Doctor from recognising her right away, she thought vaguely. Her fingers clenched loosely around the soft fabric, and here eyes were fluttering close despite her efforts to finish the thought. A cover name, just for the time before she revealed herself… something not too far off but not too obvious. Perhaps the Doctor would be able to figure it out on his own.

She fell asleep with a smile on her lips.

* * *

 

The Doctor stared at the sight before him, feeling at a loss. He had picked up an impossible energy reading, and, impossible or not, he had followed it, and found that the impossible was real and the energy’s source indeed a dying TARDIS, stranded within walking distance of a lonesome, wealthy human property. A property which, upon closer inspection, someone had broken into, and his hearts had sped up despite his stern insisting that it simply _couldn’t be_.

And now here he stood, in a stranger’s bedroom, the bed occupied by someone it didn’t belong to but who obviously couldn’t care less. Someone with a face he’d never seen, with excess regeneration energy still tangible in the air around her, fast asleep – she hadn’t even stirred at his rather hurried entrance. And regardless of the unfamiliar face, the Doctor _knew_ there really was only one person she could be, but still he couldn’t bring himself to wake her up.

Shaking his head at himself, he settled on the chair next to the dressing table to wait.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor is uncomfortable. Missy wakes up, nobody is happy, and things go everywhere except where they're supposed to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was never supposed to be continued and I don't know what happened. This means I have no idea where I'm actually going with this, or if it's actually going anywhere at all. I'm open for suggestions though, both concerning story directions and a proper title, because since it was never supposed to be a story at all I never bothered to think of a title.
> 
> Also, the Master did NOT want to play along in this chapter. At all. She was supposed to be disgustingly (falsely) cheery and annoy the hell out of the Doctor, and instead, she got pissed off at him. She's not listening to me.

It didn’t take long at all for the Doctor to become uncomfortable. He’d arrived hopeful but cautious, and with no small portion of doubt regarding his own sanity (hope could be a horrible thing), half expecting to become entangled in some sort of battle any second, and now he had ended up just… _sitting_. He had seen the newspaper and the cup on the table – the only thing out of place, and the remnants of tea weren’t yet dry, so obviously someone had left it behind not long ago, and seeing as there was no one else in this house, this someone was currently sleeping in front of him, and hadn’t been doing so for very long at all.

And, damn him and his soft heart that he would never admit to, since he wasn’t going to wake her up, he was now left sitting in a stranger’s house, watching a stranger sleeping in a stranger’s bed, and he was going to abandon that train of thought right now since he had no desire to have to start calling himself a creep.

Rassilon, this was absurd.

He double-checked the readings, just to be certain, sonic screwdriver whirring much too loudly in the quiet atmosphere, but the woman didn’t stir at the sound, and he pocketed the device again after a few seconds. There really was no need to check anything, not when he could physically feel the remnants of regeneration energy tickling his skin. He most certainly was not watching a human stranger sleep in their own house. Clara would never let him hear the end of it if he were. Not that he’d tell her anyway.

But if she indeed had broken in – and she _had_ , he needed to stop doubting that – there was no telling when the rightful owners would show up. He decided he was pretty certain that she hadn’t killed them – he hadn’t seen any signs of a fight, nor any corpses, and she certainly wouldn’t have taken the time to hide them somewhere if there were any, since she obviously wasn’t expecting anyone to show up, and had been tired enough to just throw herself on the bed, feet hanging over, without even removing her slippers. Oh, and if she was who he he thought – knew – she was, then he was going to risk his life just by teasing her about those slippers, he just knew it. He wouldn’t be able to help himself once she was awake.

He hoped she would be awake soon. It wasn’t like the Master at all to sleep through someone entering the room and bustling about. Suddenly concerned, the Doctor jumped to his feet again, already half about to lurch forward before he stopped himself. No use in startling her awake either, rather the opposite. Slowly, keeping a grip on himself, and pretending he didn’t feel like an utter moron, he approached the bed and cautiously leaned over the motionless form sprawled on the mattress.

Still breathing, deeply and regularly. Everything alright. Well, now he just felt even more like a git. Sitting back down, he was very glad that she was too asleep to have noticed his act of idiocy.

Or was she? The Doctor narrowed his eyes. It could be a trap. She could be wide awake, feigning sleep, waiting for the perfect moment to… to do something. It would be just like the Master, after all, to lure him here and into a false sense of security, only to attempt to get rid of him at the best opportunity...

The Doctor took a long look at the damp, tousled hair, at the oversized white and pink dressing gown, and the pink, fuzzy slippers, one of which had slid off her foot and landed on the floor, and firmly told himself to stop being an idiot. He should probably also stop thinking through all the remote possibilities of this being the strangest trap he’d ever encountered, and start thinking about what to do once the Master woke up from her post-regenerative slumber.

***

After two hours, thirteen minutes, and four point seven seconds of sitting, staring, leg twitching, and eventually slowly walking up and down the room for lack of interesting reading material nearby, he wasn’t any closer to knowing what to do beyond waiting for her to wake up, and had a disproportionally panicked reaction when suddenly he heard the sound of movement coming from the bed. He jumped and turned around, eyes wide, to stare as the Master gripped the pillow and pulled it a bit closer and _snuggled_ into it and this was suddenly becoming very, very uncomfortable for him. He had felt somewhat creepy before but had justified his behaviour with the necessity of keeping tabs on the Master, and it _was_ necessary of course, it was, but now he felt like he was intruding into someone’s privacy. Perhaps he should just have detained her right away, taken her into his TARDIS and left no doubt about the state of affairs, because now he didn’t even know himself what the state of affairs even _was_ and he really should have figured out a plan by now, and surely she wouldn’t just wake up now, would she?

* * *

The first thing that registered in the Master’s mind was a rare feeling of what could almost be called safety, which paradoxically instantly prompted her into a state of wariness. Her fingers tightened minutely around the soft fabric they were clutching. Still otherwise unmoving, she took a moment to recall everything that had happened – detecting a means of escape from the time lock, throwing several aborted plans together into a makeshift idea to take what might be her only chance, running into someone, fighting, regenerating, stealing a TARDIS, forcing it through, landing here, and –

And she wasn’t alone anymore. A quiet rustling sound was coming from beside her, opposite of the direction she was facing. And there had been no sign of pets in this house, she was certain. But whoever it was didn’t seem to be yelling at her or threatening to call the authorities, so she doubted they belonged in this house any more than she did. Which only served to make them creepy since they appeared to be doing nothing but simply standing around in a sleeping woman’s bedroom. Well, then.

The Master opened her eyes, stretched her stiff limbs with a demonstratively innocent little sigh, and turned around. When her gaze fell on the room’s other occupant, she let out a shriek and, eyes wide, scrambled into an upright position. “What are you doing in my house?!”

The other, a tall, grey-haired man in a suit and with a face like a permanently disgruntled owl, first appeared startled at her sudden movement, but recovered quite soon and looked less than impressed once her righteously indignant words hung between them. That wasn’t the reaction she had been going for.

“Do you make a habit of breaking into your own house and wearing clothes two sizes too big for you?”

Yes, definitely not a normal reaction to being discovered creeping around in someone’s bedroom. The Master tried to shake the faint dizziness out of her thoughts and wished she could go back to sleep. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she glared at him. “I’m going to call the police.” For some reason, he looked amused by that, and she wondered if she had made a mistake. Earth’s law enforcement was still called police in this century, wasn’t it?

“Please, do go ahead,” he said, entirely unconcerned, and she was about to give a sharp retort when it dawned on her. Either this _was_ the rightful homeowner, and he had remarkably strange ideas about how to deal with burglars – or, more likely, he was here as unlawfully as she was. And what were the chances of someone just happening to break into the very same house that she had, coincidentally, broken into a few hours before? And of that person, upon seeing her, deciding to stay and watch her sleep for no reason? Add to that the owl man’s evident amusement, the lack of surprise, the condescending attitude, and the fact that the place had to still be practically crawling with all kinds of energy traces…

She blamed the impulse to rage loudly at the universe’s twisted sense of humour on regenerative trauma and the fact that three hours of sleep weren’t nearly enough after everything she’d been through.

“I thought you wanted to call the police.”

She glared at his twitching lips.

“In fact, I happen to have a box right outside that might be of help. Even says _police_ on the tin.”

There didn’t seem to be much use in keeping up the act. It really wasn’t fair. Did he have to stop her plans before she even _had_ a plan?

Brushing a loose curl out of her face, she abandoned her glare for what she hoped was a sweet smile. “Ah, well. Good morning to you too, Doctor. May I ask the reasons for your presence? I assume you didn’t just pop by to say hello.”

She had not yet gotten up from her seat on the bed, nor was she planning to do so anytime soon – she hadn’t intended to even be awake already, for one, and then she was all too aware of how glaringly obvious their height difference this time around would become the moment she stood next to him. So, just sitting there, it was easy to concentrate solely on him, which provided her with the pleasant sight of him becoming momentarily flustered before he found an answer.

“I’d just have woken you up if that were the case.”

“How impolite.” She held back a smirk at his obvious evasion. As if in all his lives he had ever actually had a plan that went beyond perhaps two steps into the future, on a good day.

Her fingers idly twirled around a lock of hair as she leaned back a little, the perfect picture of relaxed attentiveness.

The Doctor, rather presenting the opposite impression, let out an explosive breath through his nose and stepped around the bed’s corner towards her. “What are you doing here?”

“Now really. Did you give me an answer when I asked you that question a few minutes ago?”

“ _Master._ ”

She grinned. Her name sounded nice in his new accent. “Sleeping. Or I was, before you annoyed me into waking up.”

“And that’s all?”

The Master rolled her eyes and finally did get to her feet, since it seemed unlikely that the Doctor would leave and let her go back to sleep so she had to get up at some point anyway. “No, of course not,” she jabbed irritably. “I was planning to hypnotise all of England and take over the planet through humanity’s dreamscapes, all happening from right here while lying in this bed. What did you think?”

She vaguely recalled having noticed a rather pretty letter opener on the dressing table earlier. Maybe she could use it to stab him.

“Don’t pretend it wasn’t the energy traces that led you here, you know I haven’t exactly had time to plot much. But of course, my first priority right after regenerating is naturally my next evil scheme, what else would I do.”

The Doctor had removed the letter opener. Typical. Didn’t make her want to stab him any less.

“Well, if you remember last time...”

“Entirely different situation, my dear Doctor.” Scowling at the dressing table, she didn’t quite know what to do with herself. Stabbing the Doctor with eyeliner probably wouldn’t work, and her brain was still too sluggish to come up with a proper plan. Somehow, she almost felt she was letting him down by not having one, but she really hadn’t had the time to figure things out yet.

Her jaw tightened a little at a spike of pain flashing through her head, reminding her that it wasn’t even fully over yet. A few more hours until all synapses and neurons and whatnot had settled in the proper places, until every single organ was in perfect working condition and she could properly get to know her newest self.

The Doctor was shaking his head in something akin to exasperation and stepped towards her, lips parted to say something else that wouldn’t get them anywhere, and some of those synapses chose that moment to malfunction, or simply short out. Instead of just keeping him at arm’s length, letting him talk and using the time to gather information and formulate a plan, she ran, took off abruptly and pushed him aside and was flying down the stairs before she even knew she was doing it.

* * *

Well, that had gone all kinds of wrong. What sensible person even woke up obviously, _stupidly_ soon after regenerating, preventing him from even deciding on an _idea_ of how to handle the situation? No sensible person did that, that’s who, and he should have known, because the Master had long ago strayed from anything even hinting at sensible, and now he’d have to chase after her to make sure she didn’t hurt anyone, herself included.

With a curse, he righted himself from where her sudden push had made him stumble against the bed, and took off after her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Still nobody is happy, but we can't just let Missy run off unheeded.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter this time. But good news: I have a bit of an idea what do with this by now! Like, there'll be something resembling a plot. Probably. Also I decided on an actual title, which was inspired by the song "Flawed Design" by Stabilo. It doesn't really fit this particular AU, but I think it kinda suits with the whole Twelve/Missy situation in general, a bit, from what I've seen. I'm not at series 10 yet.

The air outside was thick and uncomfortably still, the sky showing off an impressively sized collection of grey clouds, complete with a bit of grandiose drum rolls, and the Doctor vaguely wondered if he had an umbrella in his pockets somewhere.

He caught up to her a bit of a distance from the house, with grass stains on her hands and the stolen dressing gown, while she was just getting back to her feet and, it seemed, decided that her chances of making a successful escape were too slim to try it and not embarrass herself. Thankfully he was still behind enough that he didn’t even get the opportunity to help her up, since no matter whether or not he attempted to do so, he was fairly certain that she’d resent his choice. Now, she simply turned towards him with an unaffected expression, primly plucking a few blades of grass from her sleeves.

It was probably a good thing that she’s already lost the slippers previously to running off, he thought, or she’d have slipped on her way out and fallen down the stairs, and he highly doubted she’d appreciate at broken neck right at this moment.

Standing before him now, hair a mess, feet bare, and the sleeves of her dirty robe slipping down to hide her hands completely, it was impressive how formidable she looked even under the circumstances, like a queen thoroughly displeased with a subject who dared inconvenience her.

The Doctor stopped a few steps from her, and she sighed, pursing her lips. “I take it you’re not going to make an exception and let me escape.”

“You know I can’t do that.” In a rare instant of wisdom, he decided not to ask where she was planning to escape to. There wasn’t really anywhere she could run, even if she did run surprisingly fast, considering her legs were significantly shorter than his.

“You could.” She shrugged, watching him intently. “Nobody’s stopping you. I’m not harming anyone.”

This really, really wasn’t going like he had planned. Not that he’d _had_ planned it of course, or ever did plan much of anything, really, but with the Master, jumping in unprepared and hoping for the best had never quite worked out so far. And it didn’t help that he had no idea, after their last encounters, where they stood. The Doctor felt like he was dealing with a half-feral cat, if said cat had a mind as sharp as his own and tended to hold personal grudges against him.

“You broke into someone’s house.”

“So did you. Anyway, nobody was home.” The Master spread her arms, indicating the mostly empty space surrounding them and ignoring the sound of thunder rolling from not too far away. “In fact, it seems that no one is even in the general vicinity. What were you expecting me to do, sleep out in the field?”

No, of course not. What would he have done in her situation? He couldn’t exactly blame her for taking the only option available, and it truly did look like she hadn’t hurt anyone. Even though she likely would have, had someone been around. “I still can’t –“

“Oh, but you can. You can leave and pretend you’ve never seen me, and I’ll –“

“You’ll what?” He closed the distance between them, forcing her to tilt her head back if she didn’t want to stare at his chest. “”You’ll sleep it off in there and then you’ll start planning how to rule the world, if only for a lack of better options? Or you’ll run around until you find someone you can use to kill off the planet, or to kill them for a Vortex manipulator, or whatever works best? Your TARDIS won’t do you much good anymore, after all.”

He felt a little pang on behalf of the capsule she had used, but the Master, like most of his people, had never understood why the Doctor would form such a close attachment to his old Type 40.

“I refuse to come with you.” The Master didn’t yet have full control over her new face, if the half-suppressed glare was any indication, though after a few moments her expression smoothed out. “Are you going to drag me to your TARDIS kicking and screaming? I’m defenceless. I’m innocent!”

If he didn’t know her, he’d probably believe it, without question. “You’re really not. Do you need to make this difficult?”

The answer was most likely yes, just on principle. He would do it of course, would pick her up and carry her if necessary, and she’d only end up even more ill-tempered and they both knew it. She looked at him with almost pity now and folded her arms, swaying a bit on the spot. He wouldn’t have noticed if not for her close proximity, but now had to consciously stop his hand from reaching out to steady her. Did she have to be so stubborn?

She took a small, deliberate step backwards. “I’m not going to –” The Master interrupted herself with a tiny flinch and glared skywards. For a fraction of a second, the Doctor was thrown, until he felt it too – first just a few droplets of water on his skin, but their number was growing quite rapidly. Within not fifteen seconds, the sky had opened the flood gates. His jacket kept the worst of it off his torso, but he could feel his legs growing damp, and small rivulets were flowing down his face and neck and attempting to get beneath his collar.

When he looked back at the Master, he saw that the fabric of her sleeves was crumpled up like she had her hands balled into fists around it from the inside, her eyes closed and her jaw tight. She looked like she was a hairbreadth away from either screaming or attempting homicide with her bare hands, or maybe both. He took a step back.

The quiet sound of wet soil under his shoes was enough to snap her out of it. She blinked, twice, and then succeeded in banishing the murderous expression from her face. Her eyebrows rose in his direction.

“Your TARDIS is that way, I presume?”

* * *

 

It was hard to accept defeat gracefully at the best of times, and these circumstances did not remotely qualify as such. The Master gritted her teeth behind closed lips and held her head high while they walked. Her hair hung around her face in ugly, stringy strands. The stolen robe was plastered tightly to her body, which made it difficult not to wrap her arms protectively around herself in an attempt to preserve at least a bit more modesty. After only two steps, she could feel mud caking between her toes, and every time she lifted a foot, the ground tried to hold on to it before releasing it with a disgusting squelching noise.

She forced her body not to tense as a stab of pain shot through her and, a moment later, a sliver of residual energy floated away on an exhale. The Doctor was walking half a step behind her, maybe, with the rain blurring the world, he wouldn’t see her gait faltering for a moment.

This wasn’t defeat. Not yet, not any time soon. The TARDIS would provide a roof and an opportunity to rest, if the Doctor felt even the smallest bit like being charitable. At any rate, she would soon have worked out a proper plan, which ideally would involve sending the Doctor out an airlock in mid-flight, and then she would see what happened next.


End file.
